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There is no doubt that if you want to drive sales upward and increase online exposure for your business you need to have an effective SEO strategy. Most business people understand the basic purpose and function of search engine optimization. However, it is far too easy to make some fundamental and almost fatal SEO mistakes without some professional guidance.
Reflect on this pearl of wisdom: “Brand is a reflection of culture.” So says Hank Ostholthoff, CEO of Mabbly, a Chicago-based digital marketing agency. His statement illustrates the point that your brand image and what it represents to customers is hugely important. Also, it clearly illustrates why you need to take great care in protecting and enhancing your corporate image and what it stands for.
You need to take the same care when it comes to protecting and enhancing your SEO rankings.
Here is a look at some of the worst SEO mistakes you can make. Hopefully, you will manage to avoid these unfortunate turns in your path with your own marketing efforts.
Improper Use of Keyword Meta Tags
The search engine rules have changed when it comes to keyword meta tags. In fact, it is no longer the case that your site’s relevance is so heavily influenced by the content of this tag.
Therefore, aim to use the meta keyword tag as a way of quickly identifying your content, preferably in one simple line of HTML code.
Keyword Spamming or Stuffing
Again, this is a tactic that is search engines frown upon these days. As a matter of fact, this is one of the key SEO mistakes you want to avoid. If you don’t, you will experience a detrimental impact on your rankings if you overload your content with keywords in a crude attempt to attract as many visitors as possible.
Forgetting That Quality Counts
Another SEO mistake is to fill your website with low-grade content. Of course, you might be tempted to do this purely as a means of attracting a wider audience.
The proven approach, however, is to post quality and highly relevant content. When you do, visitors learn to trust your site. Then, they can begin to feel more comfortable about the idea of doing business with you.
RELATED ARTICLE: CONTENT CREATION TIPS: HOW TO CREATE QUALITY CONTENT THAT GOOGLE LOVES
Not Using Enough External Links
It can be good to share in search engine terms. Moreover, if you don’t have the right mix of external and internal links this can affect your SEO rankings.
What you are trying to do is build a layer of trust and authority. Therefore, choose your links carefully, but do make sure to get a good selection of relevant external links.
Enough Already
Patience is thin on the ground when people visit a site. If it takes too long to load they will click away and probably never return. In fact, this is an SEO mistake people don’t soon forgive.
A website that is slow to load is not good for attracting and retaining customers. So be mindful that Google notes slow websites, and this would be a black mark for your rankings.
Failing to Optimize Images
Far too many people don’t appreciate the significance of website images, and it’s a big SEO mistake not to.
If the images on your site don’t have optimized alt tags this will hurt your rankings, as Google will notice.
Choosing the Wrong Keywords
Going back to keywords, another one of the deadly sins is to choose the wrong keywords.
The bottom line is that targeting the wrong keywords in posts and pages could single-handedly destroy your SEO strategy. At the very least, it could do some serious damage.
So think carefully about every keyword and be mindful of the damage that can be done with each one that you get wrong.
How many of these SEO mistakes are you guilty of?
